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Akamai Guardicore Segmentation vs Cisco ACI comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Nov 2, 2025

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

ROI

Sentiment score
6.4
Akamai Guardicore Segmentation enhances security, provides threat intelligence, reduces personnel needs, and reassures clients with effective management.
Sentiment score
6.4
Entities report time and cost savings with Cisco ACI, despite challenges in implementation and varied financial benefit assessments.
I have not seen a return on investment in terms of specific metrics like time saved or reduced risk, but I can say that reduced risk is significant.
Senior Security Analyst at a retailer with 5,001-10,000 employees
Efficient utilization leads to cost savings and efficiency gains.
Sr Consultant at Tata Consultancy
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
6.8
Akamai Guardicore Segmentation support is praised for professionalism and promptness, though some note response time and expertise variances.
Sentiment score
7.1
Cisco ACI support is praised for responsiveness and resolution speed, but inconsistencies exist, especially with newer staff and regions.
The technical support from Cisco is satisfactory.
Sr Consultant at Tata Consultancy
When issues occur, the TAC is not able to provide much support, leading to difficulties in finding RCAs.
Network Technical Manager at KPMG
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
7.3
Akamai Guardicore Segmentation is highly scalable, efficiently supporting thousands of agents with minimal performance impact across varied deployments.
Sentiment score
7.6
Cisco ACI offers excellent scalability, enabling easy network expansion and integration, while supporting extensive device numbers and multi-site setups.
It scales very well, and I can keep adding agents and scale as much as needed.
Senior Security Analyst at a retailer with 5,001-10,000 employees
Expanding your network or your data center with Cisco ACI is not an issue; scalability is a good feature.
Network Technical Manager at KPMG
The scalability of Cisco ACI supports our organization's growth effectively.
Sr Consultant at Tata Consultancy
The solution offers high performance and scalability with connectivity options up to 100 GS.
Chief Technology Officer at Mehbub General Trading PLC
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.3
Akamai Guardicore Segmentation is stable with minor issues; users find stability strong, but micro-segmentation transition can be challenging.
Sentiment score
7.5
Cisco ACI is stable and reliable, with resolved bugs and improved support, offering minimal downtime despite occasional minor issues.
For stability, Cisco ACI rates a nine or 9.5 because I've seen three customers using Cisco ACI and once deployed, the solution is very stable.
Network Technical Manager at KPMG
 

Room For Improvement

Akamai Guardicore Segmentation needs improved customization, automation, integration, threat detection, and cost-effective solutions for enhancing user experience.
Cisco ACI needs user interface, configuration, integration, and support improvements to enhance usability and scalability in hybrid environments.
I think it is really valuable to take a course on Akamai Guardicore Segmentation because many things are not obvious in terms of how to do them correctly.
Senior Security Analyst at a retailer with 5,001-10,000 employees
I believe implementing MFA would be very useful and helpful to us.
Especialista em segurança da informação at a tech consulting company with 11-50 employees
We do not make use of its visibility and analytics features, as we are mostly using it for the networking part only.
S VP, IT Infra at ATOM
Their lack of on-ground offices can result in business losses.
Chief Technology Officer at Mehbub General Trading PLC
 

Setup Cost

Akamai Guardicore Segmentation pricing is high for some but offers flexible licensing and good value compared to competitors.
Cisco ACI is costly but valuable, offering quality and support; best for large operations despite complex licensing.
The pricing was flexible, and it has worked out well with our budget.
Senior Security Analyst at a retailer with 5,001-10,000 employees
In general, Cisco ACI is on the higher side; it's not a cheap solution.
Network Technical Manager at KPMG
Cisco's pricing tends to be on the higher end compared to other vendors.
Chief Technology Officer at Mehbub General Trading PLC
Cost is one thing that could be improved, as it is heavy for an emerging market like ours.
S VP, IT Infra at ATOM
 

Valuable Features

Akamai Guardicore Segmentation offers robust multi-platform visibility, easy setup, AI-driven insights, and versatile security management across environments.
Cisco ACI enhances data center efficiency with seamless integration, automation, scalability, micro-segmentation, robust security, and user-friendly management.
Akamai Guardicore Segmentation offers us large visibility in all our environments and helps us to understand network segmentation and traffic.
Especialista em segurança da informação at a tech consulting company with 11-50 employees
The best features Akamai Guardicore Segmentation offers make it simple to see all of the connections that are being made to each of the endpoints, and they can be controlled by process and port.
Senior Security Analyst at a retailer with 5,001-10,000 employees
Cisco ACI provides substantial capability; you can design your network accordingly and it's part of the SDN family, providing many benefits to the organization, especially when moving from traditional network infrastructure.
Network Technical Manager at KPMG
The current tool is adequate for day-to-day operations, but we want to explore more on AI Ops and hope future versions of OpenText can support that.
S VP, IT Infra at ATOM
Its features, like easy application deployment, short deployment time for new applications or software, and eliminating the hassle of STP, are appreciated.
Chief Technology Officer at Mehbub General Trading PLC
 

Categories and Ranking

Akamai Guardicore Segmentation
Ranking in Cloud and Data Center Security
1st
Average Rating
8.2
Reviews Sentiment
6.6
Number of Reviews
20
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Workload Protection Platforms (CWPP) (11th), Breach and Attack Simulation (BAS) (5th), Microsegmentation Software (3rd)
Cisco ACI
Ranking in Cloud and Data Center Security
7th
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
6.3
Number of Reviews
103
Ranking in other categories
Network Virtualization (1st), Software Defined Networking (SDN) (2nd)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of January 2026, in the Cloud and Data Center Security category, the mindshare of Akamai Guardicore Segmentation is 18.8%, down from 25.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Cisco ACI is 4.2%, down from 6.1% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
Cloud and Data Center Security Market Share Distribution
ProductMarket Share (%)
Akamai Guardicore Segmentation18.8%
Cisco ACI4.2%
Other77.0%
Cloud and Data Center Security
 

Featured Reviews

Ken Bauer - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior Security Analyst at a retailer with 5,001-10,000 employees
Segmentation of legacy systems has protected outdated endpoints and reduces network risk
The best features Akamai Guardicore Segmentation offers make it simple to see all of the connections that are being made to each of the endpoints, and they can be controlled by process and port. The ability to control by process and port helps my team day-to-day because, since there are hundreds of thousands of connections to some of these endpoints, looking at the Reveal Map makes it simple to audit and create rules for what we want to allow. Akamai Guardicore Segmentation has impacted my organization positively because we find it difficult to remove the legacy systems, so it was very important to segment them from the rest of the network to protect them and protect the rest of our network.
Rahul Khandelwal - PeerSpot reviewer
Network Technical Manager at KPMG
Enables streamlined data center management with automation and application-centric design
The main features of Cisco ACI that I really appreciate are the application-centric and network-centric designs, allowing you to create your network according to your application. That's helpful, and it's good for one-time implementation. The automation capabilities are really helpful. We deployed one data center using Terraform, and after deployment, many automation features are available, which can be very helpful. Based on my experience, Cisco ACI provides substantial capability; you can design your network accordingly and it's part of the SDN family, providing many benefits to the organization, especially when moving from traditional network infrastructure. Many organizations are actually using the old traditional Nexus infrastructure or some old data center devices. It gives you significant control and one-time implementation capabilities, and it also provides better performance and security. Functionality-wise, Cisco ACI provides integration using automation. We implemented it through Terraform, which was easy. Those features are available, so I don't think any new features are needed right now; something new could come up, but they have implemented many improvements over the years.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
17%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
8%
Insurance Company
7%
Computer Software Company
13%
Financial Services Firm
12%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Healthcare Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business7
Midsize Enterprise3
Large Enterprise10
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business21
Midsize Enterprise19
Large Enterprise87
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Guardicore Centra?
My experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing is that overall everything worked out really well. The pricing was flexible, and it has worked out well with our budget.
What do you like most about Guardicore Infection Monkey?
Initially, I liked the telemetry part. But later, we used the microsegmentation features that we were able to deploy and found that they really stood out from other vendors. It allows us to see mi...
What needs improvement with Guardicore Infection Monkey?
Akamai Guardicore Segmentation can be improved because keeping it up to date is difficult since it is SaaS-based and updates are not on a regular schedule; I have to reach out to my contact to ask ...
What are the biggest differences between Cisco ACI and VMware NSX?
There are some very major differences between both the Products and to name a few. -Cisco ACI have physical network gear (9K Switches) where the Code runs in ACI Policy Mode & the UCS server wh...
What are the biggest differences between Cisco ACI and VMware NSX?
Once you know your way around the Cisco ecosystem, using Cisco ACI is not so difficult. It is a global product, so when you change one interface, changes are automatically reflected on every switch...
What do you like most about Cisco ACI?
The flexibility of adding new components with minimal impact on existing services running in the data center is a key benefit of this ACI-based solution.
 

Also Known As

Guardicore Centra, GuardiCore
No data available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

Santander, Frontier Airlines, OpenLink, Intermountain Healthcare, Cellcom, BancoBASE
Bowling Green State University, du, Qatar University
Find out what your peers are saying about Akamai Guardicore Segmentation vs. Cisco ACI and other solutions. Updated: December 2025.
880,745 professionals have used our research since 2012.